Night Fever
by KageNoYoko
Summary: Weiss didn't like physical contact, Ruby thrived on it. But it's amazing how someone's opinions can change in an unexpected situation involving a sick team mate on a cold night. Intended to be a one-shot, might make it a two-shot. Implied White Rose fluff.


Everyone knew that Ruby enjoyed physical contact with people, the girl was just naturally affectionate with her friends and had an upbeat personality that sucked in others like some type of cheerful black hole.

This came across as somewhat annoying for her new partner Weiss Schnee at first, but she eventually grew used to the dark-haired girl's eccentricities as the weeks passed since initiation, and she even grew used to the girl's impromptu hugs after a bit of time.

What she would not stand was how often she and Blake woke up in the morning to find Ruby cuddled up in the same bed as her older sister, hugging the blonde for all that she was worth with a large smile upon her face.

Blake brushed it off as a sort of cute interaction between the sisters, but Weiss couldn't wrap her head around how close the two could be, when her own sister was distant, and because of how her family acted she was unused to physical contact or words of encouragement from others. Her life had been filled with expectations and disappointment, and over time she had gotten used to not expecting her father to allow her closer than arm's reach, and accepted it.

Then Ruby came all but barrelling into her life with her completely different personality, and now she was trying to acclimate herself to how the girl could be so naturally affectionate with others, even people that she barely even seemed to know. It wasn't uncommon for Ruby to pull Pyrrha or Nora into a hug out of nowhere, and after a bit of coercion she even managed to get Blake to ease up on her "no-hug" policy that she had laid down days after initiation.

Weiss tried her best to hold true to her own policy and avoid caving under the girl's relentless bright personality, but not even the ice queen was strong-willed enough to resist, so she did finally agree to grudgingly allow Ruby to hug her, only when the girl felt it was absolutely necessary though.

She still ultimately refused to allow Ruby to crawl into her bed in the middle of the night like she did with her older sister, claiming that it was different sleeping with your sister than your partner, though Ruby did her best to argue the point that they were supposed to be close, if they were intended to be able to watch each others backs for the next four years.

Not that Ruby didn't try every method available to her to sway Weiss' opinion over the matter, and even Yang did her best to get Weiss to understand just where Ruby was coming from on this matter, though neither girl had much luck.

That was until December rolled around, and Weiss was almost forced to alter her choice due to an unforeseeable problem.

Out of the four girls, Weiss tended to be the lightest sleeper and could easily be woken up by the sound of Nora gallivanting around the hallways in the middle of the night after an impromptu sugar rush (which the fair-haired girl refused to allow Ruby to take part in, not wanting to see what the girl was like when filled with more sugar than the few cookies that her older sister allowed her to eat every few days), while Yang was her polar opposite and slept like a rock and snored like a sleeping lumberjack.

Blake was somewhere in between the two, and could sometimes be woken up accidentally, but she was usually not cranky about the matter and simply rolled over and tried to get back to sleep for a more acceptable time of the day. There was also the fact that the black-haired girl was known to take impromptu cat naps in the middle of the day between classes, and with her partner and team mates entering and leaving the dorm room at odd hours due to their own classes, she had needed to get used to sleeping through Yang and Ruby's antics when they came back to collect things for their next classes.

As she had discovered the day after initiation, and with Yang's explanation over the matter, Ruby tended to sleep fitfully unless she had someone to cuddle up to, which partially explained the reason why she would always crawl into bed with her older sister, and could sometimes suffer nightmares due to some form of trauma that she had dealt with as a child that Yang refused to elaborate on.

But one night when it was especially cold and even Weiss was having trouble keeping warm as she did her best to get to sleep, she was startled by the sound of Ruby coughing from the bunk above her, which wouldn't have normally concerned the girl, expect when the black-haired girl didn't stop after several seconds.

Concern growing as she threw the sheets off of her body and got out of bed, Weiss reached over to grab the housecoat that she kept hung on the bedpost closest to her head and wrapped it around herself to stave off the cold, before carefully climbing up to peek into her leaders bunk to see what could be the matter with the girl.

At first glance Ruby didn't appear to be any different from usual, and was curled up into a ball under her several layers of blankets as the other three had found her every night since the temperature began dropping, but on closer inspection the girl's face was red and she was sweating rather profusely, and upon reaching out to lay her hand on the younger girl's forehead, found that her skin was cold to the touch and clammy.

Now worried for her leader, Weiss jumped from her perch and hurried over to the other side of the room, climbing up and beginning to shake the lump that was Yang, trying desperately to wake the older sister up so that she could help her baby sister out, since she was more than aware that Yang would do anything for Ruby.

"Yang, I think that Ruby has fallen ill, you need to get up and take care of her" the white-haired girl told her team mate desperately, hoping that for a change it wouldn't take all of her effort just to get the girl to crack an eye open.

No such luck it appeared, as Yang continued snoring in a dead sleep, making Weiss panic slightly. Climbing back down and moving back to the other side of the room, Weiss climbed up and made another check on Ruby, trying to see how she was doing.

Coughing again, the girl squirmed around uncomfortably under her sheets and continued to sweat, and Weiss wracked her brain for anything that she could do to help the younger girl, her own words echoing in her mind "I'll be the best team mate ever."

Remembering that Ruby was freezing to the touch and sleeping fitfully, Weiss got a slightly unusual idea that would have normally gone against everything she stood for, but with a sigh and reminder of her own words towards her impromptu leader, she climbed further up and carefully slipped her arms underneath the shivering girl, before lifting her out of bed and moving down to the floor. 

Clicking her tongue when Ruby curled up in her arms and began shivering further, Weiss was forced to move quickly as she tucked the girl under the sheets in her own bed, figuring that putting her on a bed at ground level instead of up in her hanging deathtrap was a good idea for a first step.

Intending to step away and survey her progress, Weiss paused a moment when she felt a loose grip upon her wrist. Taking a look down, Weiss found that Ruby had managed to wrap her freezing fingers around the fair-haired girl's dainty wrist, and was hanging on seemingly for dear life as best she could, even though she was fast asleep.

Trying to remain strong against the unrelenting need to help Ruby, Weiss' conviction broke when she heard Ruby begin coughing again, and after a small sigh, moved the sheets aside and climbed into the same bed as her young leader and after some adjustments, got herself comfortable as she held the black-haired girl close to her in an attempt to warm her up.

Swearing to herself that if Yang made one smart comment about this in the morning when she was doing her best to make sure that her little sister didn't freeze in the night, Weiss somehow managed to drift off to sleep holding onto Ruby, unaware of the small smile on the black-haired girl's face as her nightmares became a wonderful dream about a warm beach and a white-haired goddess that made her wishes come true.


End file.
